


One Year (compare to chapter 9 "Goodbye" in full version)

by I_am_lampy



Series: The "It's All Fine" Collected Works Deluxe Edition [10]
Category: Sherlock (TV)
Genre: Canon Divergence - The Reichenbach Fall, Grief/Mourning, M/M, Pre and Post Reichenbach
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-06-29
Updated: 2017-06-29
Packaged: 2018-11-19 08:55:36
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,204
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11310030
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/I_am_lampy/pseuds/I_am_lampy
Summary: September 27, 2011Mrs. Hudson and I went to your grave today.





	One Year (compare to chapter 9 "Goodbye" in full version)

* * *

**"Choke" OneRepublic**

Well, I've been lookin’ for some new words

To say just how you got to me

I wrote some letters that I might burn

Cause then you're not just history

~*~

**September 2011**

John carries a little brown notebook around with him at all times. It's small enough to fit into his pocket. He uses it to take notes on cases. Nine hours after Sherlock kills himself, John's sitting in his chair, staring at nothing. He's just woken up from his wank in Sherlock's bed. He picks the notebook up and begins to write.

 

_September 15, 2011_

_I would have stepped off the roof with you, if you'd asked. I would've done anything for you, if you'd asked. Why did you leave me? Why did I let you leave?_

 

_September 21, 2011_

_Today was your funeral. I wish you could have been there. So many people love you. Did you think we didn't? Is that why you jumped? Poor Molly. She has to go to work every day knowing that you were on the top of her building and she could have stopped you if she'd known. Maybe I should've got off the phone with you and dialed Molly._

_But I didn't think you were really going to jump. I still believed in you right to the bloody end._

_September 24, 2011_

_Mycroft came by today and said he wants to keep paying rent on the flat for as long as I want to stay. A suspiciously large amount of money was deposited in my bank account today as well. I swear. Fucking Mycroft. Can't say I'm displeased, though. Now I don't have your card to hand all the time, it helps to have some extra money. Though I spend a lot of it on going down the pub. Probably not the wisest use of my time or money. Don't really give a fuck, though._

 

_September 27, 2011_

_Mrs. Hudson and I went to your grave today. I asked you to stop being dead. I told your gravestone all the things I should've told you when you were alive. If I'd told you, would you still have jumped? The thing is, I thought I really knew you. Like, in a way nobody else knows you. I thought I was special. In the end, though, I wasn't. I was just another person you couldn't be honest with._

_September 29, 2011_

_I don't know why I'm writing this shit._

~*~

**September 2012**

As soon as September rolls around, John falls into little pockets of sadness at random times of the day. The closer he gets to the fifteenth, the sharper the sadness gets. After the twelfth, he spends every night at Gerald's. He's not trying to escape his own flat, the home he and Sherlock had together. It's just that he feels so emotionally fragile. He can't stand to be alone. When they're at Gerald's flat, John stays curled up around him, like Gerald can protect him from the looming anniversary date.

~*~

_October 1, 2011_

_I should've told you. God, Sherlock. I feel like I'm drowning. I can't sleep in my own bed. I can't sleep at all. I see you everywhere and when I close my eyes, you're dead._

_October 4, 2011_

_~~I will never fucking forgive you for doing this to me. If there's a heaven or a hell, I'm going there and I'm going to kill you. No, I'm going to kiss you and fuck you and then I'm going to kill you, you selfish fucking piece of shit.~~ _

_I don't mean it. God, I love you. I am so fucking in love with you and I never told you and it hurts, Sherlock. I can't breathe. I'll be looking down some little kid's throat, checking their tonsils and all of a sudden, I'll remember that you aren't alive anymore and I'll find myself gasping for breath._

_And at night. God, at night's the worst, I think. I wake up, gasping for breath and reaching out for you as though my subconscious expects you to be in bed. That's fucked up because why should I reach for you when I wake up at night when you were never there in the first place?_

_I'm always reaching for you and I want you to reach back. But you don't._

 

_October 24, 2011_

_Mycroft and I had tea today. He told me he knows I was in love with you. He said you knew you were loved. Did you? I told him it sure doesn't feel like you knew you were loved. It feels like you thought you were a failure. And see, that's the thing, Sherlock. I know you're not a failure or a fake or a fraud ~~or any other F-words except Fucker and Fucking Cocksucker and Fucking Arsehole for fucking leaving me.~~ I tried to tell you on the phone that day. Why didn't you listen? It's a magic trick, you said. As though anything you ever did wasn't based on cold, hard evidence._

_I love you so much and I miss you so much and I'm afraid I'll never be okay again._

_October 29, 2011_

_I'm tired. I keep going, though. You know why? Because people depend on me. Do you see how that works, Sherlock? I can't just go jumping off fucking buildings because there are people who need me. There were people who needed you, Sherlock, people who depended on you. I needed you. I still need you. ~~I hate you so much~~ and I forgot what your laugh sounds like and your clothes don't smell like you anymore and I lie in your bed every night and think about dying so I list the people who would be upset if I died. Mrs. Hudson. Lestrade. Stamford. Sarah. Mycroft, haha. Yeah, believe it or not. Mycroft and I have tea once a month. He says he's always been "fond" of me and that I am a "link" to you. Whatever the fuck that means. I think what he's really saying is we can be miserable together because we both loved you. No, not  loved. We both LOVE you. Still._

_Not just still. Always. I will never stop loving you._

 

_Christmas 2011_

_I will never stop paying the price for loving you._

 

_January 19, 2012_

_The new year brought more of the same. Get up, shower. Work. Come home. Try to eat something. Go to the pub with Lestrade or Stamford. Home. Sunday supper with Mrs. Hudson. Rinse and repeat._

_It's not as hard now, though. At first, all I wanted was for the grief to GO AWAY because it hurt so fucking much. And it still does. I still think about you every day, but it's not all day. ~~At first, when you died~~ You didn't  die, Sherlock, like from some disease or something. You willingly jumped off a fucking building. You chose to leave me behind. ~~You selfish bastard. I'll never forgive you~~._

_The first month all I did was cry. Got dehydrated I cried so much. Sometimes I do that thing where I'll go, "Oh, I can't wait to tell Sherlock when I get home," and then I'll remember that there is no Sherlock. Then I fucking cry, which is ridiculous because it's been four fucking months._

_It's so fucking frustrating, you know, being the "widower" but being treated like just the flatmate of that bloke who died. I feel like the spouse you left behind, but everyone else just moved on. I can't seem to move on, but at least it doesn't eat me alive anymore. I think that scares me more than grieving for the rest of my life, the idea that I could ever not love you like this._

 

_March 11, 2012_

_I don't know how to tell you this, but I met someone yesterday. I think it's time for me to stop writing to you. His name is Gerald. Yes! it's a him! Oh, my God, John Watson is BISEXUAL. God, you would be having a field day, wouldn't you?_

~*~

Grief, Gerald says, is like a broken glass. You can glue the pieces back together and it will still hold water, but a tiny bit will always seep through the cracks.

John says that's the most horrible thing he's ever heard, and if Gerald was trying to comfort him, he's doing a shit job. Gerald laughs and laughs.

On September fifteenth, exactly one year after Sherlock's suicide, Gerald goes with him to the cemetery. John carries a smallish metal bowl and the notebook as well as a box of matches. John's plan is to burn the notebook and then scatter the ashes on Sherlock's grave, but the day is windy and even using their bodies to block the wind, the matches keep going out.

Finally, they have to squat down and form a hunched windbreak with their bodies to get the matches to light. After several attempts, they get the edge of the little notebook smoldering, but it goes out before the flame can spread. They laugh, their lips chapped from the sudden cold, dry weather in the last couple of days.

"Maybe we should've burned it before we left the flat," Gerald suggests.

"I think you're right. Symbolism trumped by practicality."

"We can burn it back at the flat and put the ashes in a baggie and then we can come back," Gerald offers. "Or you could just keep the notebook."

John stuffs the bowl, notebook and matchbox in his coat pockets, pushes himself up and holds a hand out for Gerald. John pulls him into a bruising hug. He buries his face in Gerald's neck.

"I love you," John says fiercely into the skin under Gerald's jaw. "If Sherlock knew I was telling you I love you while standing on his grave, he would have a fit."

"I love you, too," Gerald says. "You don't think he'd be pleased you were happy? I mean, you are, right? Happy, that is?"

"I am _very_ happy, and no, he wouldn't be pleased about it. He would expect me to spend the rest of my life in widow's weeds grieving his loss. For a man who said he didn't care about romantic entanglements, he was an incredibly possessive and jealous bastard."

"He loved you," Gerald says.

He tries to cup John's face with his hands for a kiss, but his hands are cold and John smacks them away with a yelp. Gerald flinches and then stumbles on the uneven ground, bangs his knee into the solid marble gravestone, grunts in pain, bends over to look at his knee and falls on his face.

John shrieks with laughter.

"You bastard!" Gerald laughs. "Your possessive ex-boyfriend is getting his revenge and you're laughing at me?"

"Even beyond the grave, Sherlock causes trouble," John says affectionately.

They're howling with laughter while John tries to get Gerald to his feet. They attract the disapproving glare of a man with two teenage girls. Feeling guilty (but not really) for laughing in a graveyard (which is like laughing at crime scenes), John helps Gerald to his feet.

There's a pavilion on the grounds and John guides them there, but they go slowly because Gerald's knee hurts when he puts weight on it. Under the pavilion, the benches are laid out like in a church, although there's no altar. John has Gerald sit down with his leg stretched out on the bench. He crouches next to Gerald's leg and pushes Gerald's trouser leg up to see his knee.

"My goodness, you bruised it pretty badly. That's quite swollen," John says. "Let's get you home and get some ice on it."

Gerald leans close and murmurs, "This is a shame. I was planning to get on my knees and suck your cock when we get home."

John's eyes go wide and his mouth drops open slightly before he snaps it shut.

"Do not give me an erection in a cemetery, Gerald," John says.

Then he ignores his own directive by leaning over ever so slightly and nuzzling against the crotch of Gerald's trousers. Gerald's back shields them from anyone who might see unless they were to come around the front. He licks a line up the fly of Gerald's trousers.

"You're insatiable," Gerald says, shaking his head like he's disappointed. "Let's get home so you can suck my cock instead."

"C'mon, then, gimp," John says, helping him up. He lets Gerald use him as a crutch as they walk to the tube station.

~*~

_May 26, 2012_

_I talked to Gerald about maybe looking for a job in an A &E. He says his friend Rebecca works at the RLH. She's a doctor, too. He never said before, but when I asked him, he said he didn't want to be chatting about his friends all the time and making me feel lonely. I laughed when he told me that. ~~He looked so cute, all sheepish, trying to take care of me. He's so fucking sexy and yet he can be so adorable and sweet. He is so hot. The sex is incredible. I've never had sex this good in my life. Sweet Jesus. Probably because of the prostate thing.~~_

~*~

At Gerald's flat, John helps Gerald into the sitting room, removes his trousers, and makes an icepack for his knee. He hands out two paracetamols with a glass of water and then gets on his knees and delivers the promised blowjob. Gerald declares John's technique for giving head a cure for his banged-up knee. Then John orders Thai and they watch telly, curled up together on the couch. John changes his icepack out a few times until the swelling goes down. John takes Gerald to bed, opens him up with his steady and gentle doctor's fingers. John turns them on their sides so Gerald doesn't have to bend his knee. As he pushes into Gerald's body, he says _I love you_. Gerald's fingers dig into John's arse cheek and then grip his thigh, pulling him closer. One of John's arms circles Gerald's chest from under his body and the other is curved over Gerald's hip so John can wrap his hand around Gerald's dripping prick.

After John comes, he takes Gerald in his mouth for the second time that day. He slips two fingers inside Gerald, whose hole is slippery with John's semen, and feathers the tip of his middle finger over Gerald's prostate. Gerald comes with a shout, his body almost bending in half with the force of his orgasm. His nerves are alight even after his orgasm is over and he shivers while John holds him close. John kisses his cheeks and his forehead and his eyes. He tells him again. _I love you._

~*~

_May 14, 2012_

_I had sex with Gerald the other day. Like, you know, where he was inside me. God, that's hard to write. I really thought you would be the first man to...there's not a good word. I thought you would be the first man to put his cock up my arse? Yeah, whatever the romantic phrase for that is. That's what I thought. And you weren't. He was. And you know what? Not once that day did I think about you. That was two days ago and I only remembered you today and I panicked a bit, you know? Because I realized yesterday that I want this with him. I want a future with him. I like him so much. I don't have to be careful how I touch him, like I did with a woman. He's funny. He knows all about wines. He's good with money. He can work a chip and pin machine without having to verbally abuse it. I love the way his lips feel. I gave him a split lip when I had a nightmare and he forgave me. His arms are really strong, like ridiculously strong. Cause, like I said, he beats three or four people a day, haha! Anyway, yeah, his arms are...and his hands, his fingers. God, he can do amazing things with his fingers._

_Okay, I know, you don't want to hear that. It's just that I have a little crush, I guess._

_He has friends, like real ones. He wants me to meet them and I'm going to and maybe they'll become my friends._

 

_June 2, 2012_

_I met Gerald's friends Cyril and Rebecca last night. They all went to Oxford together. Apparently, I have a thing for men from the upper class. Haha. They call Cyril "Cynical Cyril" because he doesn't believe in true love. Then he told me, "I do believe in true love for other people. I just don't think anyone will ever love me like that." _

_That made me sad, to hear it and I said, "That sounds like something my friend Sherlock would say."_

_As soon as it was out of my mouth, I wanted to take it back. I didn't want to talk about you last night because I was enjoying myself. For the first time since you killed yourself, I can see a future without you._

_I love you Sherlock, but if you're alive, I beg you...please don't come back. Let me have my life._

John stops writing after that. There's only one page left anyway. John likes the symbolism. One page on which to write the rest of his life.

~*~

**September 16, 2012**

The next day, back at his own flat, John takes the bowl and matches out and lights the notebook on fire. He watches it while it burns, more to keep a watch in case it sets anything else on fire, but as the flames consume the little book, John finds himself teary-eyed, then openly crying, then, finally, he slides to the kitchen floor and sobs so hard his stomach muscles are sore the next day.

After there's only a pile of ashes and bits of paper left, John puts the bowl in the fridge so the ashes can cool. He puts the kettle on, then goes into the bathroom and cleans his face. He makes a cup of tea and drinks it while reading the paper. He has a second cup of tea. After an hour, he checks that the ashes are cool enough to take out.

He pours the cooled ashes into a Ziploc baggie and puts it in his pocket. After locking the front door, he takes the tube to the station nearest the cemetery. He finds himself rolling the plastic baggie with his fingers as he walks the rest of the way.

He crouches in front of the gravestone and pours the ashes from the bag into his hand and pushes them into the ground with his fingers so they won't fly away. He does it one small handful at a time until the baggie is empty. He crumples the bag up in his hand and shoves it in his pocket.

He looks around to make sure nobody can see him, and then bends forward and presses his lips against Sherlock's name etched on the marble.

"I would've loved you like that," he whispers.

John gets up and walks in the direction of the tube station, fingering the empty bag.

~*~

**Author's Note:**

> *Canon says Sherlock faked his suicide on June 15, 2011, but I chose September 15, 2011, because it works better for the timeline of this series and also because why would he be wearing that great bloody wool coat in the middle of the summer?
> 
> **Thank you to Jenn, who I just can't live without. She makes my writing better, bolder, she soothes my writerly worries, researches stuff, guides me, encourages me. In short, Jenn, i am forever indebted to you. Should my writing ever become the paid type, i shall insist you come along.


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